Double Bluff
by ThessalyMc
Summary: John's not telling Sherlock, Sherlock's not telling John, and neither is telling Mycroft just what happened in Karachi.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This story tells the tale of just what it is that John has been hiding from Mycroft, as mentioned in chapter 11 of After the Fall. It will be 3 chapters long, plus an epilogue. I will publish one chapter a day, through the 3rd chapter, with the epilogue waiting until after the end of AtF (hopefully before the US premier of S3 if I can't manage by 1/1).**

**The plot bunny that bugged me until I wrote this escaped from a set of PMs exchanged with Sevenpercent. Many thanks to her and to kate221b for lending me their eyeballs. :)**

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His mobile buzzed with an incoming text. John jerked with surprise, even though he had been anticipating the notification. Hoping for it with an intensity that bordered on prayer.

He shifted his anxious gaze down to screen and sighed with relief, feeling tension drain from his shoulders. It was from Sherlock. Of course it was.

_John? - SH_

John was more grateful than he could express that the message had come now, before he had to turn off the phone for his flight. He'd had to wait for Sherlock to initiate contact, not willing to take the chance that a message would distract Sherlock, or alert others to his presence as he made his escape. If Sherlock was texting him, though, that meant he was safe.

Of course, it also meant that he was checking up on John, which likely meant that he suspected John's participation in the clandestine rescue mission the consulting detective had taken upon himself. John hadn't really expected to be able to go undetected. If he managed to call in personal favors to put him in position to assist and get him there in time, he had no doubt that his genius flatmate would deduce his involvement. If not during the operation, then after. He might not ever say anything about it – not when doing so would reveal his own role – but he'd know.

John had managed it. He owed more favors now than had ever been owed to him, but he'd been where he needed to be. Now it was time to get back before anyone suspected his part in things. Before anyone _else_ suspected.

The phone in his hand buzzed again. Sherlock was anxious.

_John? -SH_

The tannoy announced a final boarding call for his flight. John picked up his carry-on and draped the strap over his shoulder, approaching the gate while pecking out his response.

_Bugger off, Sherlock. - JW_

John handed his ticket to the flight attendant, accepting the stub she returned to him with a smile and a nod. He walked down the jetway to the plane. His phone buzzed again.

_John. Where are you? -SH_

_You are not doing this, Sherlock. - JW_

John hoped his response, in keeping with the tone he usually used when Sherlock's texts caught him at an inconvenient time, would divert the detective from questioning him too closely.

_Doing what? Are you all right? -SH_

_Yes, I'm fine. Stop texting me. -JW_

John found his row and apologized in broken Arabic to the business man he had to step over to reach his window seat. He settled in, shoving his bag under the seat in front of him before buckling the seat belt.

_Where are you? You are not in the conference hotel. -SH_

_I'm on a date, Sherlock. One you aren't going to ruin. -JW_

John smiled as he sent the text. It wouldn't fool Sherlock for long, if at all, but it would reassure him that John truly was fine. And safe.

_You don't speak German. -SH_

Sherlock had checked his blog for updates before texting, then, and seen his post about attending the medical conference in Berlin. He'd been fortunate that the timing of the conference had allowed him to travel legitimately to Germany, hopefully out from under Mycroft's watchful eye, before going to ground.

_Interest in sex does not need translation, you twat. And she's American. Conference attendee. -JW_

_How long is the conference? I may need you for a case. -SH_

_You may be home already from your case in the Highlands, but I'm still several countries away, for Christ's sake. You know I can't come running to help with whatever trouble your case is getting you into this time. -JW_

_You always come running. -SH_

_Bugger. Off. Bloody tosser. I'll be home in 3 days. I'm turning off my phone. STAY OUT OF TROUBLE. -JW_

_And you. -SH_

John turned off his phone and slipped it into his pocket as the flight attendant came by, nodding politely as she met his eyes. Moments later the plane pulled away from the gate. As they taxied to the runway a tone sounded over the intercom and a voice began speaking. The announcement was given first in Arabic, then in English.

"_Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Qatar Airlines flight 221 from Karachi to Berlin with service through Doha. Travel time today will be fifteen hours, twenty-three minutes, expected arrival at five forty AM, local time. If you would direct your attention to the placard in the seat pocket in front of you ..."_

John tuned out as the aircraft safety features were listed, the adrenaline that had kept him moving for the last 72 hours finally wearing off. The plane had barely lifted off before he slumped over against the window and allowed sleep to claim him, secure in the knowledge that Sherlock was safe, his mission accomplished, and he was on his way home.


	2. Chapter 2

"You hacked my computer."

"Hello to you, too, Sherlock. And if by 'hacked' you mean I used your password to log in, then yes, I did," John said agreeably, moving to the kitchen to put away the groceries.

"Why did you use my computer? Yours was right there."

"And that right there is why I used yours," John replied, putting the milk in the refrigerator and turning to face his flatmate.

He'd arrived back from Germany the day before, and had seen evidence in the flat that Sherlock had returned as well, but this was the first time the two had laid eyes each other since John had come home from the surgery to find a scrawled note from Sherlock stuck to the kettle, and the man's computer next to his on the sitting room table. That had been ten days ago.

"How was the case, then?" John asked, his expression amused. "In the Highlands of Scotland, was it?"

"Cold," Sherlock replied shortly.

"Well, that's to be expected, isn't it? February in Scotland ..." John said, "Are you going to tell me any more than that? For the blog, of course."

"Are you going to tell me?"

"What, how I knew your password?" John asked, deliberately sidestepping the request to tell of his own week of travel. "You told me that the night before I moved in here."

"I did not," Sherlock retorted.

John chuckled. He could tell that Sherlock was replaying their entire conversation from the night in question, from leaving the scene of the first case they'd worked together, to the Chinese restaurant, to the return to Baker Street and the episode with the drugs bust.

"You did. You just didn't predict that I'd ever understand it. But I did. Eventually."

He saw Sherlock's eyes flash with something that might be pride. John wondered if he should feel patronized. He snorted softly.

"Go on, then. Tell me," Sherlock instructed, collapsing into his armchair, fingertips pressed together against his lip, an interested expression on his face.

John smiled and shook his head, putting the last of the groceries in the cupboard and filling the kettle.

"After I agreed that I'd get rid of Napoleon's head – and I haven't forgiven you for the trick you pulled with that, you tosser,"

"Yes, you have," Sherlock interrupted with a smirk.

"– and move in," John continued, ignoring the interjection, "you said that left only the cocaine on your computer. For a while I worried that you meant you'd hidden another stash in the bloody thing, but you'd said that cocaine was _on_ the computer, not _in_ it. You are precise with words. You didn't mean drugs."

"No," Sherlock agreed.

John flicked a glance over at him as he grabbed mugs down for tea.

"I couldn't figure it out, and decided that it honestly didn't matter. The flat was clean, and you were just playing some kind of word game with me. I let it go and forgot all about it, until I came home from the surgery and found your note on the kettle and your computer on the sitting room table right next to mine."

John finished preparing the tea and put the milk back in the refrigerator. He picked up his RAMC mug and sipped from it, before picking the other mug up by the rim and carrying it carefully over to Sherlock. His flatmate accepted the tea with a nod, sipping the hot beverage gingerly while John eased himself into his arm chair, mindful of his own full mug.

"Last I checked, a trip to Scotland did not require a passport, let alone three of them," John said amiably.

"You know where ..."

"I hide cigarettes for your bloody danger night seek-and-find games, Sherlock. Of course I know where you keep them."

Sherlock's eyes narrowed, but he gestured with his hand for John to continue.

"You left me a note, Sherlock. A _note_ about your case in Scotland. You text me twenty-seven times a day on average, and you leave a _note_ to tell me that you're off to the Highlands of Scotland on a case, and you'll be out of contact the whole time? I know you think I'm an idiot, but I did think you thought more highly of me than that," John said with a disappointed frown. "So, yes, I checked and found your passports gone. Didn't take much to deduce that your destination was not, in fact, Scotland. Travel further afield takes planning, which you would not have done on my laptop. That's why you got off your lazy arse to get your own computer, and why I needed to get on it."

"Mmmm," Sherlock hummed in agreement.

"Cocaine. On your computer. Your bloody password was cocaine," John said with a snort. "You probably think that's some kind of cosmic joke, don't you?"

"You do, too," Sherlock drawled, his mouth twitching into a smirk.

"It is morbidly amusing," John admitted, shaking his head. "You are barking mad, you know that?"

"I've been told."

"Of course it wasn't in English. I tried translating it into each of the twelve languages you speak ..."

"Fourteen."

"What, really? Fourteen?"

"English, of course, Arabic, French, Frisian, Gaelic, Greek, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Latin, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish."

"I should have guessed Hebrew, but Frisian? Why?" John asked.

"It was for –"

"– a case, yeah," John said with a smile.

"I can get by in Flemmish and Japanese, too," Sherlock said with a shrug.

"You're bloody –"

"– amazing, yes, I know. You were saying? About the password?"

John laughed and took a mouthful of his rapidly cooling tea.

"When I ran out of languages that I knew you spoke, I spent an hour with Google, translating it into every option they offered and typing it in. After that, I realised that as much as English might be your mother tongue, it's not your preferred language. You're a scientist. A chemist."  
Across from him, Sherlock's eyes lit up. John smiled.

"The chemical formula for cocaine didn't work. I didn't really expect it to, though. Might as well have written it in English. It's a good thing you've got that periodic table on your wall. Well, good for me, anyway. You probably have the bloody thing memorized, but I needed to see it. I tried swapping the chemical symbols for their atomic numbers. I tried substituting atomic weights. I changed the numbers to their alphabetic equivalents – lower case to denote subscripts. Eventually I thought to add on your preferred dosage, using the chemical symbol in place of the percentage. Two hours of running through increasingly wild ideas of how to write the word cocaine in chemist code, and I had a string twenty-nine characters long that worked, and I was in."

"Well done, John."

"Ta. You should clear your browser history, you know."

"I did not think it necessary. I'll remember to do so in the future."

"Or you'll just change the password."

"Perhaps," Sherlock mused.

"Anyway, I saw the emails from the eyes you had watching the situation, and found your travel plans. I made arrangements to put myself where I could back you up, if it was necessary. Rather glad I did."

"Your assistance was timely," Sherlock admitted. "Will you tell me?"

"Will you tell me?" John asked, turning the question around.

John watched as Sherlock withdrew. His expression shuttered.

"The case was brought to a successful end. That's all that matters."

"Right," John said with a sigh, letting it drop. He pushed himself out of the chair and went to put his empty mug on the worktop. "Successful case, and a nice dinner with the client to celebrate."

"No," Sherlock's voice was heavy with distaste.

"No?"

"I don't socialize with clients, John. I don't do _dinner_."

"Right then," John agreed with a nod. "Hungry?"

"Starving."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: This is the end of this story. There is a planned epilogue that will be published after the end of After the Fall, so ... in about 2 weeks.**

**Many thanks to kate221b and Sevenpercent**

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Sherlock was no longer at his microscope when John came back through the kitchen door. Glancing through to the sitting room, John saw him sitting in his armchair in his thinking pose, his eyes lit in amusement. There was no sign of the phone.

"You could have warned me, you know," John said conversationally as he filled the kettle. "You were obviously expecting something like this, but you didn't say anything about it. Not a single bloody word."

"Given how you worked out my password and plans, I assumed you'd be expecting this as well."

"Ta," John said, accepting the compliment as he flicked the kettle on. "But no, I wasn't."

"It may have worked out for the best, this way. Meeting Mycroft blind is preferable to meeting him anxious."

"I'm always anxious when I meet with your brother," John retorted. "You know, for a moment there, when he was telling me about the American witness protection scheme, I thought maybe that was your doing. Maybe that's what you'd arranged for her after smuggling her out of Karachi and away from the Taliban."

John glanced across the room and noted Sherlock's studiously blank expression. Still not interested in sharing the details, then. He shook his head and turned back to readying the mugs for tea.

"Of course, the next thing he said not only exposed the whole American business as a lie, but also revealed that he believes Irene to be dead. I don't know why I'd assumed that it was just your involvement in the whole bloody mess that you were keeping off the radar, but I did. I damned near gave the whole thing up when I realised that he didn't know she'd survived."

The kettle clicked off and John poured the hot water, stirring briefly before pulling the teabags out and tossing them in the bin.

"I knew you wouldn't."

"Good on you, then. I didn't. I would never have believed myself capable of deceiving Mycroft Holmes. Must be your bad influence."

"You're welcome," Sherlock said smugly as he accepted the offered mug of tea.

"How did he not see it? I'm an open book when it comes to the two of you."

"While he almost certainly noticed your increased agitation at the news of her death, he would have attributed it to other causes, which he would have anticipated and has every reason to believe are true."

"Oh?"

"He would have ascribed your distress to concern over how the news would affect me," Sherlock explained. "Did he mention that wretched 'danger night' nonsense to you when you returned the file?"

"He did, actually. I told him – again – that there are no drugs in the flat, and he just gave me a smile that suggested he thought I was fantastically dim, and told me not to let you out of my sight," John replied. "I'm not giving you cigarettes for this, you know."

Sherlock's only response was a scowl. John grinned in return.

"So, because he assumed I'd worry about your reaction to her death, he didn't realise that I was anxious about hiding her survival from him."

"Precisely. Relax, John. You've given nothing away."

"Right. Good, then," John agreed, then continued, "Thank you, by the way."

"For what?" Sherlock asked, nonplussed.

"Your face when I came upstairs to tell you Mycroft's lies," John replied. "I'm overly familiar with your 'I don't give a flying fuck' expression, and I know when the indifference is a mask. You're not usually so obvious when you're pretending. Told me that something more was going on than just me being the bearer of Mycroft's bad news. You kept me from blundering too badly while I worked it out."

"As I intended," Sherlock said, with a hint of smugness. John huffed at him, irritated and amused.

"Was bloody uncomfortable, trying to talk to you about her without actually talking to you about her," he paused. "It was the phone, yeah? It's bugged."

"Obviously."

"Why did you take it, then? You knew it'd be bugged, he'd have known that you'd know, you'd have known that he'd know you knew … So, why?" John asked. "Aside from giving you the pleasure of watching me squirm?"

"He expected me to take it. Doesn't do to disappoint the British Government."

John mused on that while he drank his tea.

"If you hadn't taken it, he'd have wondered why you didn't behave as he expected."

"He'd have stuck his nose where I'd rather he didn't, yes."

"Right," John agreed, understanding.

"Knew you'd get there in the end," Sherlock replied.

John couldn't help but smile at the smirk he saw hovering around Sherlock's lips.

"Tosser," John grinned. "Wait," he said as a thought struck him, his grin fading. "If he expected you to take it, that means he expected me to give it to you, even though it's technically government property. I'm not sure I like what that implies about his opinion of me."

"He trusts you to tell me no when it matters, John."

"You having her phone doesn't matter then? No, of course not. It's been wiped, of course, and bugged," John said, "so what's the point, exactly?"

"Sentiment."

"He thinks you're sentimental about her?"

"Don't you?"

John paused, his mug at his lips, and shot a look at Sherlock. The consulting detective sat back in his chair, his expression curious. Real curiosity, not a mask put on to seem interested. John sipped his tea before answering.

"I ... No. Whatever it is that motivates you with regard to her, it's not sentiment. Respect? Curiosity? Fascination? I don't know. But I wouldn't say it's sentiment."

"No," Sherlock agreed. "But it isn't my sentiment that I was referring to."

"You think," John said slowly, "that Mycroft sent you the phone because _he_ is sentimental."

"It's … an apology of sorts."

"An apology?"

"Guilt is a powerful motivator."

John recalled Mycroft's phone call after Sherlock had left him at the morgue the night of their Christmas party. It had been evident that the elder Holmes had believed his brother was distressed at Irene's supposed death, expecting that Sherlock might fall back to drugs to dull his alleged pain. He had clearly gone to some effort to create a believable lie to cover her beheading in order to keep Sherlock from further grief over The Woman's fate.

John shook his head. That wasn't guilt, it was … he sighed. Sentiment.

"Are all of your brother's sentimental gifts bugged, then?" he asked.

"All his gifts are bugged, sentimental or not. Have a care what you say around the stethoscope he sent you for Christmas."

"I'll be sure to bin it the next time I'm at the surgery," John replied, shaking his head. "Where is it, then? The phone?"

"Desk drawer," Sherlock said, tilting his head to indicate the drawer by the window.

"What will you do with it?"

"What he expects. I'll see if he missed wiping anything from memory, and crack it open. The explosives inside will destroy the phone, and his bug."

"Yes, well, try using that massive brain of yours to find a way to not to level the flat while you're at it," John admonished sternly as he pushed out of his chair and went back into the kitchen. "Mrs Hudson still gives me grief about the bullet holes in the wall. Blames me for not hiding the gun rather than you for shooting up the place."

Sherlock only grunted in response.

"Will this be the last we hear about it, do you think?" John asked, pulling a handful of takeaway menus from the top of the refrigerator and leafing through them.

"If she keeps her head down," Sherlock replied.

"Her history doesn't suggest that's very likely."

"Her future depends on it."

"We're not ever going to discuss it, are we?"

"I think not."

"Well, I wish her luck," he said resignedly, then he held out a pair of menus so Sherlock could see them. "Chinese or Thai?"


End file.
